Published January 13, 2015
A Nashville judge has given an unusual punishment to a teenager to stand outside police headquarters holding a sign that says officers are "not pigs."
Nineteen-year-old Austin Bean's public defender argued Friday that his First Amendment rights were being challenged.
Davidson County Criminal Court Judge Mark Fishburn ordered the teenager to hold a sign reading, "Respect the police, they are not pigs as I stated on my MySpace page" and "There is nothing funny about guns and nothing cool about gangs."
The order was a condition of the probation the teenager received for a charge of coercing a witness. Bean posted threatening messages against another teenager on MySpace.
Bean will not have to follow the order until his case is appealed.
https://www.foxnews.com/story/tennessee-judge-orders-teen-to-hold-sign-saying-cops-are-not-pigs